Study: Children living near Houston
Ship Channel have greater cancer risk

From the Houston Chronicle:

The results of an 18-month study released today identify for the first time a link between cancer risks and hazardous air pollutants being released in Harris County.

In particular, the study conducted by the University of Texas School of Public Health found that children living within two miles of the Houston Ship Channel had a 56 percent increased risk of contracting acute lymphocytic leukemia when compared to children living more than 10 miles from the channel.

In addition, children who were living in areas with increased emissions of 1,3-butadiene from petrochemical industries were found to have an increased risk of developing any type of leukemia, acute lymphocytic leukemia and acute myeloid leukemia.

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This comes as no surprise, what with a wildly understaffed and underbudgeted EPA, reliance on industry self-reporting of toxic emission levels, and Texas' own laws mandating "voluntary compliance" with pollution standards. And, oh yeah, let's not forget about the way Republicans have gutted citizens' ability to sue companies that injure them.

A company is a collective entity, treated by the law in many ways as though it were a human being, but, having no soul, it does not behave like a human being. Companies necessarily have no morals or ethics--certainly, the individuals working for companies have morals and ethics, but they are also contractually bound, and receive payment, to think of their employers first, and everything else second. That is, the only thing guiding business behavior is the bottom line.
That's why these emissions in Houston are killing kids. These polluting companies, which are completely aware of what they're doing, are able to save a great deal of money by releasing toxins into the environment because there is no financial consequence for doing so. They don't really care about the life lost. It's not their problem. And as long as they contribute heavily to politicians who are totally dependent on corporate cash to stay in office, it will continue to not be their problem.

Fuckers.

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